This Man Has Flown Over 20 Million Miles On United!

It is almost sobering to think how much flying 20,000,000 miles actually is. Over the years, he has clocked in:

803 times around the earth

3.5 years spent in the air

Three and a half years in the air?! United just released a special video to commemorate crossing the milestone:

As it turns out, he crossed the threshold on a flight from Newark to Los Angeles two months ago.

And the man has been busy. In 2010, just nine years ago, he was only at nine million miles:

While his overall average his 416,000 miles per year, over the last 15 or so it has been closer to 1,000,000 miles per year.

How does he do it? He helps clients sell cars around he world, often to Asia or Australia. The travel is for business. And the travel is real: United does not count flights on partners toward lifetime flight miles. Award flights also do not count.

Stuker has a United aircraft named after him and enjoys top-tier Global Services status for life (though you only need to fly 4,000,000 miles on United for that).

CONCLUSION

Stuker makes my own MillionMiler flight seem like peanuts in comparison. What an accomplishment. And while some might question whether it is all worthwhile, it would be foolish to feel sorry for him. As he states in the ABC interview above, distance makes the heart grow fond. I travel for work too, thankfully not on the scale of Stuker, and the thrill of travel is undeniable. But so is coming home to those you love.

About Author

Matthew

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he
travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 120
countries over the last decade. Working both in the aviation industry
and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in the New York
Times, Chicago Tribune, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, BBC, Fox News,
CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, Al Jazeera, Toronto Star, and on NPR. Studying
international relations, American government, and later obtaining a
law degree, Matthew has a plethora of knowledge outside the travel
industry that leads to a unique writing perspective. He has served in
the United States Air Force, on Capitol Hill, and in the White House.
His Live and Let's Fly blog shares the latest news in the airline
industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs and promotions, and
detailed reports of his worldwide travel. His writings on
penandpassport.com offer more general musings on life from the eyes of a frequent traveler. He also founded awardexpert.com, a
highly-personalized consulting service that aids clients in the
effective use of their credit card points and frequent flyer miles.
Clients range from retirees seeking to carefully use their nest egg of
points to multinational corporations entrusting Matthew with the
direction and coordination of company travel.

16 Comments

@ Matthew — This is not for business, but insanity. Think about it. It takes about 40 hours per week to fly 1 million miles per year. I cannot imagine a business that would neessitate this traveling. I feel sad for this man.

It makes me wonder how many collateral miles he may have on other carriers. If he travels that much to different clients I would assume he has a ton of miles on other carriers and partner airlines I would assume this is the most airline miles for anyone on any carrier. Likely more than many flight crew members.

20 million miles and they served him some Moët? Then I realised it was for the entire plane – nice gesture by UA. That lifestyle would be horrific, although his immune system would be well tuned by now.

It’s NOT FOR BUSINESS….
Bravo for buying the lifetime pass 30 some years ago. It is a fact that he bought the pass and flies for free now. He only books one way tickets because it earns double the mileage from UA.

He rarely flies for business (5% max of his overall travels). The rest are mileage runs, staying at his destination for an hour or two MAX before getting right back on the plane (sometimes the same plane) and departs. His pass is his primary source of income(tax free income).
-United pays on average of $7,000-$10,000 each way.
-United also pays the taxes.
-4 RT per week = 8 one way tickets ($60-$80K)
-Double it because his companion seat is almost always occupied (the seat generates $/gift cards for him)
-16 one way tickets per week
-Costing $150,000-$200,000 to UA.
-Then he and companion will earn a whopping 16 x 75,000 miles for 1.2 million spendable miles to their MP account from UA for one week of flying.
-When the miles are redeemed, that costs UA AGAIN. 1.2 million miles can be redeemed for $8,000 in gift cards.
-$8,000 in gift cards converts to $7200 cash.

If you do the math, just using the numbers above comes to $11 million dollars a year.
There’s many more expenses UA incurs that you can add to that.

Any stories about how much he helps United are bogus. Good for him though. Just call it for what it is.

Truly astounding. Makes even my busiest years as a 1K look like recess. I do understand the sense of happiness frequent flying brings many and getting stir crazy when you’re on the ground too long. But life isn’t a dress rehearsal.

I agree that at this point there is some vanity involved with this. With the hours involved i find it very hard that there is not a more efficient way to run his business without this much travel…
And he only works in UA cities?

You say the travel is real?? What he’s doing is killing United. He often laughs that United is waiting for him to die.

Bravo for buying the lifetime pass 30 some years ago. It is a fact that he bought the pass and flies for free now. He only books one way tickets because it earns double the mileage from UA.

He rarely flies for business (5% MAX of his overall travels). The rest are mileage runs, staying at his destination for an hour or two MAX before getting right back on the plane (sometimes the same plane) and departs. His pass is his primary source of income(tax free income).
-United pays on average of $7,000-$10,000 each way.
-United also pays the taxes.
-4 RT per week = 8 one way tickets ($60-$80K)
-Double it because his companion seat is almost always occupied (the seat generates $/gift cards for him)
-16 one way tickets per week
-Costing $150,000-$200,000 to UA.
-Then he and companion will earn a whopping 16 x 75,000 miles for 1.2 million spendable miles to their MP account from UA for one week of flying.
-When the miles are redeemed, that costs UA AGAIN. 1.2 million miles can be redeemed for $8,000 in gift cards.
-$8,000 in gift cards converts to $7200 cash.

If you do the math, just using the numbers above comes to $11 million dollars a year.
There’s many more expenses UA incurs that you can add to that.

Any stories about how much he helps United are bogus. Good for him though. Just call it for what it is.